Another Vow
by petnurser
Summary: One vow is kept, another made
This wasn't where he wanted to be, but it was where he needed to be. He would rather be sitting holding her hand as she lie unconscious in a hospital bed than finding the man that did this to her. He was driven to do this, to lurk in a seedy bar in the dead of night, listening to seedy men who harmed others for pleasure trying not to lose his temper as they so richly deserved. The blonde one spoke of a woman he attacked and beat down a few nights before. He left her bleeding and unconscious in the alley he dragged her into, committed unspeakable acts on her body, and left her to die in that cold alley. What he didn't know was she regained consciousness long enough to use the phone her husband insisted she carry concealed at all times. She was now in hospital unconscious. The woman was one of the best pathologists that St. Bartholomew's Hospital had ever hired; Molly Hooper. Her husband was one of the best detectives that ever lived; Sherlock Holmes.

It was an early spring evening. A multiple car accident with multiple fatalities on the M4 meant that Molly was working late and she worked a nearly fourteen hour day that day. Bodies examined and initial reports done (the final reports could wait until the next day) she set off for home. She called him to let him know she was picking up his favorite Chinese take-a-way for a late dinner and would be home soon. A short time later he got another call. This one with a weak voice on the other end saying, "It hurts, Sherlock. Help me." And with a sigh in his ear, nothing.

He quickly found the GPS location of the phone and only hoped his wife was with it. He called Lestrade and John with the location and rushed to get there. Sherlock got there seconds before the others. Molly was naked from the waist down, her clothes strewn over the alley. She was broken and bleeding. It took all he had to pull himself together.

She was pale and moaning something he couldn't quite make out. In retrospect he knew what she was saying but didn't understand it at the time. His wife's left wrist was at an odd angle and swollen. Her upper left leg was not straight, but angled slightly and hugely swollen. Swelling was beginning to appear around her eyes and temple. Broken femur, injured wrist, head trauma. Boot prints were very visible on her leg. Moisture glistening on her upper thighs. The bile rose in his throat as he struggled to remain calm but it was of no use. He stumbled to a bin and lost the tea that he had been drinking before she called him.

Sherlock felt a hand on his shoulder and whipped around ready to confront whoever was touching him and felt a moment's confusion when he saw his friend, John. "The medics are with her. Molly's not in good shape, Sherlock. You should go with her." A numb nod, a wonder at the lost time and he found himself sitting in the ambulance taking her rings off her left hand before it swelled anymore.

Looking at the rings in his hand he remembered their wedding day. It was less than one year ago. The fake Moriarty was caught within 24 hours and imprisoned on terrorism charges. He had plead guilty to all charges after getting word that if there had to be a trial there would be no quarter. He WOULD be found guilty and his sentence would be horrific. He was jailed for 20 years and, in this case, 20 meant 20. Sherlock's first stop after that was St. Bart's morgue.

Sherlock finally told Molly he loved her and asked her to wait for him. Next, he voluntarily checked into a residential rehab facility for two months. It wasn't easy, but he knew he had to learn to live with his addiction and beat the temptation so he could even remotely approach being the man that he felt Molly Hooper deserved. After he got out, having done well in rehab, they married in April. Now, less than a year later, he sat in this seedy bar, nursing a pint, and listening to her attacker boast.

"That woman Thursday night. Do you know who she is?" Sherlock interjected.

"Nah, just some dumb bird. She deserved it. They all deserve it." Blondie replied.

"Really? A random woman deserved to be violently assaulted and raped?" Sherlock was barely able to contain his rising anger.

"They all do, mate." Blondie said smugly and with a hint of a smirk.

"So you are fully admitting that you raped, beat, and left this woman for dead?" The anger Sherlock managed to contain in its own bubble threatened to rupture.

"It's not like she was anyone important so what's it to ya?" _You have no idea_ , Sherlock thought.

Sherlock stood to is full height and loomed over the man. "That woman is Molly Hooper. Her husband is Sherlock Holmes and her brother-in-law is the British government." He paused to let that information sink in. "And I am Sherlock Holmes." Sherlock said as he stood up.

The blonde man visibly paled as two men in suits stepped up. One simply said, "Come with us." Molly's attacker offered no resistance as Mycroft's agents led him away. For years, friends and family wondered what happened to Joe. Missing person's reports were filed with no results. Eventually he was declared legally dead. No one in the Holmes family, and by extension the Watson family, spoke of him again.

After Joe was taken into custody by Mycroft's agents, Sherlock couldn't shake the feeling of needing a shower so he went home before heading back to the hospital to be at his wife's side. As he held her uninjured hand she started to stir.

It took a while for Molly to reach full consciousness. The pain was terrible but even in her daze she was afraid of most of the available medications for pain. She just kept mumbling, "The baby, be careful for the baby." It all clicked now; Molly's happy attitude over the phone, her exhaustion the past week or so, the moaning when he found her in the alley. She was pregnant and worried that any pain medication would cause the baby that was developing in her womb harm.

They hadn't been trying for a baby but they hadn't been taking precautions against pregnancy either. He had no doubt that Molly would be a wonderful mother; he had reservations about himself as a father. His childhood was idyllic. He was raised in a cottage in a country setting with two parents that absolutely (and still did) loved each other and their three sons. Sherrinford's loss when he was five and Redbeard's three years later transformed the intelligent, outgoing boy into a quiet, retrospective one. At that stage in his life, and until John entered it, caring was NOT an advantage. John taught him to care again and Molly was the one that benefitted the most from it. Sherlock Holmes would always be grateful to John Watson for teaching him to care again. He felt himself reverting to uncaring when she was unconscious but the love crashed back into his heart when she awoke. That unnerved him a little and he would have to guard against it.

The medical staff quickly got some safe pain medication on board and Molly fell into an easy sleep. Sherlock rested his hand on her still flat abdomen awed a little by what was happening in there, an ultrasound exam shortly after she came to and had good pain control indicated that everything looked OK, their baby was OK. She would be OK, with time and support. She was safe and so was their child. He would do anything to protect them. Another vow filled and another made.


End file.
